'Romney Offends the Pundits'

Daniel Halper

[T]he Embassy in Cairo issued its statement saying that "The Embassy of the United States in Cairo condemns the continuing efforts by misguided individuals to hurt the religious feelings of Muslims—as we condemn efforts to offend believers of all religions." It added that, "Respect for religious beliefs is a cornerstone of American democracy. We firmly reject the actions by those who abuse the universal right of free speech to hurt the religious beliefs of others."

One problem is that the statement came not long before Egyptian protestors stormed the Embassy and some of them made it over a wall and into the compound. An Embassy Twitter post after the assault said its earlier statement "still stands."

Mr. Romney reacted late Tuesday with his own statement: "I'm outraged by the attacks on American diplomatic missions in Libya and Egypt and by the death of an American consulate worker in Benghazi. It's disgraceful that the Obama Administration's first response was not to condemn attacks on our diplomatic missions, but to sympathize with those who waged the attacks." He followed Wednesday with a press conference reinforcing his criticisms of the Administration's "mixed signals" on "our values."

The Obama Presidential campaign jumped on the remarks Wednesday as inappropriate, yet a "senior Administration official" had told the website Politico later on Tuesday night that "The statement by Embassy Cairo was not cleared by Washington and does not reflect the views of the United States government." So the White House can walk away from its own diplomats, but Mr. Romney can't criticize them?